NaNoWriMo

As our candy handovers are going away, November is already here and with that come National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo).  For all those who have ever thought about writing a book or Novel, now is your chance to do it.  NaNoWriMo's main goal is to get people to write, its 30 where you take on idea and turn it into a novel for your friends to ready, and who knows maybe you can sell it and be the next big author.

But all that aside you are not alone in this venture, their is an online community that has been built around NaNoWriMo where you can keep track of your word count, and post parts of your story for all to ready.  By the end of the month your 50,000 word novel will be done and you can say you have accomplished something, and if not then you still are a winner for trying and then their is always next year to do better.

So I urge you all to give this a try, I know I am and, you should get some friends or coworkers to do it with you always better to have some others doing it with you to keep you on your goal.  Well I better get back to my novel writing before I get behind.

You can find more information at NaNoWriMo's website: http://www.nanowrimo.org/  good luck to you all and have fun writing

Public's Privacy

Recently Google’s new user agreements are released, which changed Google’s privacy setting. The public has made a big deal about this and many other tech problems of privacy and tracking your location, but the public has seemed to miss the idea that your local stores like Target are tracking you by your purchases.

An article in Forbes.com How Target Figured Out A Teen Girl Was Pregnant Before Her Father Did, brings forth how Target tracks a person based on their purchases. The article states that when a customer at target uses their credit card they are assigned a number in their computer system and whenever you buy anything with that same credit card at target those purchase are added to your customer history. Target can take this date and provide ads and coupons especially for you based on what you have bought in the past.

In the Forbes article Target was able to prove that the teen age girl was pregnant based on her purchase and was able to predict when she was due. This article demonstrates how much information a store knows about their customers all based on purchases.

Recently consumers have been up in arms about apple and location tracking, Facebook and privacy setting, and Google’s recent user agreement changes. But it seems that many people forget how much information the stores they shop at all the time knows about them. Next time you slide your card remember that you are being tracked, just like the apps and web services you are up in arms about.

PowerTrekk Mobile Charger - from CES 2010

With the increase of portable technology, being able to take your devices anywhere you go including; camping, backpacking/hiking, and many other outdoor activities. The only limitation to taking your device on your activities is being able to keep the battery charged when you have no power outlet. In a hall filled with solar technology for that idea comes something a little different, the PowerTrekk mobile charger. The PowerTrekk is a hydrogen gas device that will convert the gas into electricity.

This device uses a small power pukk that when you add a small tablespoon of water converts the solid chemical into hydrogen which the device harnesses into power. The device can charge anything with an USB plug; it can charge an iPhone on a single pukk. You can also plug the device in before hand to hold a charge before you go out, and us the power pukk for instant power when you need more.

The device seems to be better than a solar charger because you can have instant power with the pukk and water, where you have to wait for the solar panel to collect enough light for energy. The down side is that you need to have a steady supply of power pukks, being that they are one time use only, to continue to use it where with a solar panel you are good to go. The PowerTrekk should be hitting stores around March and will cost $299 and the power pukks will be $3 each, you can visit their website for more information www.powertrekk.com

The PowerTrekk is an interesting idea, using hydrogen gas to harness energy, and only time will tell where this technology goes.

CES 2012

So last week I had the opportunity to go to CES and see all the cool new gadgets that will be coming out in the coming year. Now that the show is over comes the time to reflex on all that I have seen and got the chance to play with. Over the next few weeks I will be working on some new posts about the products that I have seen at CES. Some of the things I plan on writing about are the free samples that we got at the both, which I will make sure to judge just the same way I would with other products I have to buy. For now you can see some of the pictures that I took while at CES on my tumblr: http://nanook86-ces2012.tumblr.com/

Stay tune to see what I write about.